DENIED: Case falls to Fairhaven in volleyball sectional final

Fairhaven stopped Case dead in its tracks.

In laying claim to their fourth sectional volleyball crown in as many years, the second-seeded Blue Devils staged a gutsy first-game comeback and then took full charge in beating the ninth-seeded Cardinals 3-0 (25-23, 25-12, 25-15) in the Division 3 South final on Saturday afternoon at Pembroke High School.

In laying claim to their fourth sectional volleyball crown in as many years, the second-seeded Blue Devils staged a gutsy first-game comeback and then took full charge in beating the ninth-seeded Cardinals 3-0 (25-23, 25-12, 25-15) in the Division 3 South final on Saturday afternoon at Pembroke High School.

Fairhaven (21-1), the Division 2 South champs the previous three years, played their trump card, aka junior outside Katie Leidhold, early and often.

The high flyer unloaded 17 kills, several in the supersonic range, in simply overmatching the Case defense. Leidhold hammered eight of those kills in the third game and accounted for the match’s last two points with a kill and then a block.

“Katie, she dominated that (match) with kills ,” Case coach Denise Levesque said. “We tried to block her. We got a couple of blocks on her, but she hit through our blockers, she hit into our defense, and it was hard to stop her.”

By far the most intriguing game was the first.

Fairhaven roared ahead 7-1 and 14-6. With Leidhold in the back row, the Cardinals (15-10) scored the next 13 points – the final 12 on Erin Abdallah’s serve – and led 19-14. Down 21-17 soon after, the Devils scored five straight points.

Case junior middle Ellie Roberts (8 kills, 8 digs) answered with a kill before Leidhold killed and Macy Roderick recorded a lucky ace when her serve hit the net cord and dropped to the floor on Case’s side for a 24-22 lead.

A Santerre kill staved off the first game point. On the second, Fairhaven senior setter Harleigh Becotte came through with a resounding block.

There was no Case consensus on whether losing that game after running off 13 straight points ultimately took the steam out of the Cardinals.

“I don’t think so,” junior libero Erin Abdallah (14 digs) said. “I don’t think we ever let down. We just had a tough run. They have Their really good hitters up there. They were able to come back.”

“We always go down in the second game,” Santerre said. “We try to stay up, but once we’re down, we’re down. It’s hard to get back up.”

In the second game, Fairhaven led 17-9 and, after Case scored three straight points, the Blue Devils scored the last eight.

Leidhold served the final seven points, recording four aces, three of those in a row to end the game as Case could not handle her buzz-saw topspin.

Fairhaven also dominated the latter portions of the third game, pulling away from a 16-14 lead to score nine of the match’s final 10 points to once again get to within two wins of its first state championship.

Page 2 of 2 - “They want to go all the way. This is our fourth straight South title,” said Fairhaven coach Karen Arsenault, whose team tied Bourne for the South Coast Conference title. “We fell short the last three years, in the semis or finals, so they’re looking at the big prize.”

Case charged into this South final having lost the two regular-season matches to both Bourne and Case but having beaten Bourne in the South quarterfinals on Cape Cod.

“We knew coming into this game Fairhaven was going to be tough,” Levesque said. “I was pleased that we drew Bourne in the seedings in the brackets because I knew we had a better chance of beating them and hoping to see Fairhaven in the South finals.

“It’s hard to beat a team three times, but they were successful at it.”

Santerre said she was satisfied with the season as a whole but not with Case’s final performance.

“We fell apart, and didn’t play our hardest, and made stupid errors,” she said.